The perennial favourite The Guns of Navarone, about a British military action in Greece during the second world war, came towards the end of Dimitri Tiomkin's career.  The Fall of the Roman Empire was still to come, and he was to live for many more years, but this 1961 movie was one of his last major assignments.  It was also one of his most celebrated - the movie is still much-loved today, and the score equally so.  It is surprising therefore that the Oscar-nominated score had never been released on CD - until now*.  This is an ambitious reconstruction and rerecording of the entire score, conducted by Nic Raine, with Silva Screen's house band the City of Prague Philharmonic on duty (though it isn't a Silva Screen release).

The score is a delight from start to finish, with Tiomkin (unsurprisingly) avoiding an overtly militaristic approach and relying instead on the lush melodies which so dominated the majority of his scores.  The memorable main theme crops up all over the place, and is always welcome, being sprightly and impressive.  It is with the action music that the score really comes into its own, however, and there is certainly plenty of that.  The lengthy "Sea Scene and Storm" is a wonderful example of Tiomkin's craft, with rousing, brassy action material combining with more restrained, subtle scoring for a wonderful piece, beautifully constructed.  Action of a much darker kind comes in the thrilling "The Cliff is Conquered", featuring very busy low-end brass and piano, with Tiomkin creating a particularly dramatic effect.  That ends the first half of the film and indeed score, being followed by the intermission music, "Yassu", a mock-traditional Greek piece the composer conjured; it features several times through the score, and on this album even in a vocal version performed by Keith Ferreira, who doesn't seem like an ideal singer for the song but does OK.

The romance continues in the beautiful "Anna", a ravishing piece full of emotion.  As the album goes on, the thrills continue to build, with a series of marvelous set-piece cues combining wonderfully well.  The brilliant "Destroyers on the Way" is arguably the score's highlight, with taut suspense and action writing combining to wonderful effect.  It all builds up to the lengthy, grand finale which, as was often in the case in older scores, seems to last virtually as long as the rest of the score.  Tiomkin was a master at providing films with rousing finishes, and The Guns of Navarone is certainly no exception, with the choir entering for the sort of finale which would be unimaginable and sound ridiculous today, but always seem terrific in scores of a certain vintage.

This album marks the debut release from a new label, Tadlow Music, headed up by James Fitzpatrick, who produced so many of Silva Screen's recordings, including their terrific recent four-disc compilation of Tiomkin's music.  (As a special bonus, this album even includes four tracks from The Sundowners, a little-known but bright Tiomkin score from 1960.)  It's a great way to start a record label!  Before this album was made available, there was much criticism of the CPO's performance; almost exclusively, this came from people who either hadn't heard it at all, or were basing their opinion based on a handful of audio samples.  In truth, there is nothing wrong with the performance at all - unsurprisingly, the Prague players are rather more at home with Tiomkin's distinctive writing than they sometimes are with more obviously western European or American music.  If I were to have a criticism of the recording, it would be exactly that - the literal recording itself.  Full of reverb and bass, it doesn't seem to do the music or the performance justice.  That apart, this is a wonderful release of a top score, down to the detailed and lengthy liner notes.  It's limited to 3,000 copies but available from the usual online outlets.